Reuters poll: No bounce yet for Obama

posted at 8:02 pm on September 6, 2012 by Allahpundit

Not sure how useful this is but I subjected you to an eeyorish “no bounce yet” post about Romney during the convention so I owe you a tentative high-five. Mitt ended up with the most modest possible bump after the GOP shindig ended; maybe this new poll is a sign that O won’t fare any better.

Major, major caveat: The poll was conducted (via online interview) from September 2 through today, which means the sample contains lots of people who hadn’t yet heard Michelle Obama or, especially, Bill Clinton speak. As I say, not that useful, but worth flagging as a marker for the more robust polls that’ll trickle out tomorrow and Saturday.

The latest daily tracking poll found Republican Mitt Romney still clinging to a narrow lead of 45 percent to Obama’s 44 percent among likely voters. Romney had led by 46 percent to 44 percent in Wednesday’s poll.

“We’re not seeing a sort of glimmer, at this point, of a bump,” said Ipsos pollster Julia Clark…

“I do think we probably will see a small bump still. Maybe we won’t start seeing it until Friday, Saturday or Sunday. I think it will be very modest,” Clark said…

For Romney, Thursday’s poll was good news. He is holding steady so far despite rampant criticism of him at the convention.

Even if he gets an immediate bounce, remember that Romney’s about to unleash the heavy attack-ad artillery tomorrow. He could have done it earlier this week, but why waste money on ads before O speaks when there’s a chance they’ll be instantly forgotten if he performs well tonight? Better to let him have his moment in Charlotte and then unload to try to instantly neutralize his momentum. And what happens if O gets a surprisingly big bounce and the Romney fusillade fails to dent it? Well, then we’re going to an all-eeyore-all-the-time format here at HA, baby. Prepare yourselves. Gray skies at the ol’ blog homestead until September at least.

Blowback

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And what happens if O gets a surprisingly big bounce and the Romney fusillade fails to dent it? Well, then we’re going to an all-eeyore-all-the-time format here at HA, baby. Prepare yourselves. Gray skies at the ol’ blog homestead until September at least.

There is at least a decent chance that Mitt Romney loses. I hope we’re all prepared for that reality.

That said, he will keep the GOP close enough that we will, in all likelihood, take the Senate. Then, if the Liar in Chief wins, it’s a matter of whose kung fu is better.

And what happens if O gets a surprisingly big bounce and the Romney fusillade fails to dent it? Well, then we’re going to an all-eeyore-all-the-time format here at HA, baby. Prepare yourselves. Gray skies at the ol’ blog homestead until September at least.

Come on, folks. These are media polls. Barack will get his bounce — probably a big one. That was baked in before this abortion-a-palooza ever started. It won’t work, though. The preference cascade is already rolling. Too many Americans have figured out that their fellow Americans feel the same way about this empty suit that they do. Late-night comedians are ripping him apart. Celebrities are freely criticizing him. And, most of all, he has never, ever, not even one time been asked to defend his dismal record — the first time will be at the debates. He should have done twenty Fox News interviews to prepare; it would have been the best debate prep ever because they are the only ones who would have asked him tough questions. Even if the lapdog moderator doesn’t challenge barack, Romney will. And barack will be unprepared. And he will stammer. And he’ll be a big ole picture of sweaty, darting eyes fail.

Of all the tracking polls, Reuters/IPSOS is the one most biased in favor of Barry. Any pro Romney result is buried, and any result that can be exaggerated in favor for Barry is played up.

I posted before Reuters/IPSOS loudly proclaimed last Saturday that Romney’s small bounce from RNC was short lived, based that on one day’s sample (Barry 44, Romney 43). The next day, it was 45/45. Reuters headline for that day was “Barry poised for a bounce”. Then the tracking poll disappeared on Monday. On Tuesday Romney was ahead by 1, and Reuters headline was “Barry got high marks for personal attributes”. It again disappeared yesterday, maybe because Romney was up 2.

This tracking poll likely has a Dem overweight: on Sunday’s poll, Romney has a 10? point advantage among independents, and the final tally was a tie.

Couple of points in addition:
Today’s result reflected samples taken after the Moochelle’s speech.

And Romney was behind Barry 46 percent to 42 percent in the Reuters/IPSOS poll just prior to the RNC Convention. That is a 5 to 6 point flip.

CHARLOTTE — President Obama’s supporters are hoping he’ll deliver a boffo address to the Democratic convention tonight — perhaps one equaling Bill Clinton’s widely-praised speech from Wednesday night. Maybe he will, maybe he won’t. But even if he does, Romney strategists believe it will have little effect on the undecided voters who will pick the next president.

The reason is that research has shown those voters discount Obama’s rhetorical ability when they listen to him. They’ve heard him a lot, perhaps too much, in the last five years. Should he make a great speech — something he has not actually done as president — they will simply say, “Oh yeah, we know he can talk. We’ve heard it all before. It’s what he’s done that matters.”

If that is true, it suggests there’s really not much the president can say that will change minds on Thursday night — even those minds that are most open to change. Perhaps there are some things Obama could do to improve his standing with independent voters, but talking isn’t one of them. So on Thursday night, there could be a downside for Obama, especially if he comes off badly compared to Clinton. But upside? Other than praise from some of the usual media suspects, not muc

We all know these people lie as often as they breathe. Up is down, black is white, and wrong is right. Just ask them, they’ll lie to your face without breaking stride. THEY WILL GET THEIR MEDIA BOUNCE!!! (It will be as fake as Charlie Crist’s tan, but it WILL happen.)

I’m more concerned about possible false employment data coming out tomorrow that will place the unemployment rate at 7.9% or even 8.0% which will then be gleefully spun by the drooling leftist Media as proof that Obama’s plan is working. If there are any undecideds left, they will then swing to Obama, giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Come on, folks. These are media polls. Barack will get his bounce — probably a big one. That was baked in before this abortion-a-palooza ever started. It won’t work, though. The preference cascade is already rolling.

Rational Thought on September 6, 2012 at 8:21 PM

I feel the same, except for that meme that came out of Plouffe today of all days, saying don’t expect a big bounce.

I’m more concerned about possible false employment data coming out tomorrow that will place the unemployment rate at 7.9% or even 8.0% which will then be gleefully spun by the drooling leftist Media as proof that Obama’s plan is working. If there are any undecideds left, they will then swing to Obama, giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Decoski on September 6, 2012 at 8:33 PM

Pyrrhic victory. If they put out fake numbers tomorrow — and pretty much everyone believes they will — barack will go up in the polls, and employers, who are starting to breathe a little at the prospect of a Romney win, will become terrified at the prospects of re-election again. They’ll contract, hard. And the employment news for October and November — right before election day — will be horrific.

I see this as all good. First, the trend is clearly in Mitt’s favor. He has had to move up steadily to produce a tie in that average of polls. What’s more, the Razz poll of likely voters (the most reliable in my book) has had him ahead consistently for a few weeks now. And last, but not least, Obama’s approval remains at about 47.5% (with Razz at 46% or a -8 approve/disapprove). An incumbent does not typically get more than his approval and that implies a 5 or 6 point or more Romney win.

These days the markets are reacting much more to the Fed’s cryptic quotes, the latest Euro central bank plan to print unlimited money, the next of the PIGS to need a bailout, etc. I don’t think that the election or the fiscal cliff in Jan is even on Wall Street’s radar yet.

Folks getting unemployment below 8% at this point is impossible. The reason being that even if hiring ticks up (in anticipation of a Romney win), this means the workforce participation rate also goes up, driving up the topline unemployment number.

For unemployment to go below 8% at this point we would have to be creating over 500k jobs a month the next 2 months and even that would barely make a dent.

But…but Obama hasn’t yet released the Kraken of his superlative oratorial skills! Just you wait ..his speech is going to be the greatest thing since the Gettysburg address! We will all be so mooooved as to have no choice but to vote for him . . . Mmm, mmm, mmm

No, no bounce yet for Obama, as far as I can tell. Also, frankly, I don’t really expect it, for several reasons. First, because the democratic convention has been a real mess, full of numerous controversies and missteps that would blunt any bounce Obama might get. Second, because if memory serves correctly, in 08, when Obama was still shiny and new he only got a fairly modest bump. It seems somewhat unlikely that Obama would get a bigger bump during his second convention, and if this holds true it limits whatever good it could possibly do for him.

Finally, Obama has been throwing money at advertising all summer but hasn’t been able to get out of the mid 40′s. This suggests that the remaining undecideds out there are going to extremely difficult for Obama to crack. It must be pointed out that the remaining undecideds are likely also going to be difficult for Romney to crack, I suspect we’re talking about the most distrustful most cynical segment of independent voters out there. This alone makes dramatic movement in either direction somewhat difficult.

Additionally, I feel inclined to point out that the DNC’s line-up has, not been very inspiring. Their best speaker so far has probably been Michele Obama, but her speech was designed more to improve personal likability so I doubt it’ll help with the vote totals much. Then you have Bill Clinton, whose speech was long, rambling, and oftentimes incoherent. The press ate Clinton’s speech up of course, but my sense is that most people lost interest in it well before it was over. Then you have Obama himself, and to be frank, as many speeches as he gives I don’t think his speech will help very much. The man loves seeing himself on national television, and as such has really overexposed himself over the past few years. Romney speaking was helpful because a lot of people still didn’t know who he was, and a good speech was able to energize Romney voters and help improve his likability. Obama, however, is a known thoroughly known quantity, so unless he can come up with compelling answers for his failures I rather doubt his speech will help much.

Of course, I could be wrong, but I don’t think so. The electorate has so far been resistant to sudden changes, and I just don’t see that suddenly changing.